by Paul Howard
The fact that most of his friends – and they are considerable in number – seem to have found life enriched by their association with Anquetil is crucial. Although Anquetil’s ménage à trois eventually imploded, he nevertheless succeeded – if that’s the right word – in maintaining this unique domestic arrangement for 12 years. What’s more, all the formerly antagonistic members of the Anquetil clan now live in a considerable degree of harmony, still united, it seems, by their attachment to Jacques. Sophie, Annie and Jeanine all live near each other in Corsica, of course. Dominique still lives at Les Elfes but is not excluded from this unlikely sorority.
‘We all get on fine,’ says Sophie. ‘We’re going to celebrate the 20th anniversary of his death with a reunion for his friends. It will be held at the chateau. My brother runs it with his mother, and we get on fine. We went off to Morocco for five days together. I think the relationship I have with my brother’s mother is more like that of a confidante, a friend. We call each other regularly, even if for a period we were separated and had to face up to the fact that several women loved the same man, which can cause difficulties, shall we say . . .
‘When he died, there wasn’t a great relationship between everyone – far from it. But now, 20 years later, it’s as if he’s managed to bring us back together, because there’s always this link between us. There’s lots of love and affection, and the passing of time has healed the negative things and left the positive aspects, with lots of love.’
It is this very evident love and affection that Anquetil managed to inspire from those who knew him that is perhaps his most fitting epitaph. Even those who weren’t dazzled by his exceptional talents or blind to his faults were persuaded to like and admire him. Indeed, to many, he was a hero. But the status of hero comes with a caveat, as Anquetil’s close friend Pierre Chany explained to Sophie:
‘The ancient Greeks used to admire the divinities, the titans, the giants, the demigods and other heroes, but not completely or without reserve: they knew them to be fallible. A hero is above all a man with superior powers to the rest of us mortals but who is nevertheless a man. That’s exactly what your father was.’
Palmarès
THE FOLLOWING LIST OF victories and placings in Anquetil’s career is designed not to be comprehensive. With 184 career victories and many more podium finishes, a complete list would dilute his major achievements. The aim, instead, is to draw attention to his finest victories – and also occasionally to point out his significant failures. Even such a list may fail to give sufficient precedence to some of his accomplishments, however.
First, there are his numerous victories at track events and in particular at six-day races, including the then prestigious Paris Six Day – not bad for a man often criticised for his lack of all-round talents and his exclusive focus on his strongest events. Then there are his four victories in the Super Prestige Pernod competition (open to all professionals) and three in the Prestige Pernod competition (open only to French riders). These were effectively the predecessors of the World Cup and now the ProTour rankings, with overall success determined by tallying up victories and placings throughout a year in a bid to determine the most consistent performer over a whole season. Another way of putting ‘most consistent performer’, of course, is best rider. The fact Anquetil won the two competitions seven times between them indicates even more clearly just how much of an all-rounder he was.
Last, but not least, come his time-trial successes. Given that the majority of these races are no longer on the calendar, and those few that are don’t have the same prestige as they did in the 1950s and ’60s, it can be difficult to gauge the scale of Anquetil’s achievements. In which case, it may help to consider the verdict of Brian Robinson: ‘The only time trial I rode with him was the Grand Prix de Genève. I got within three minutes of him in eighty miles. I was proud of that – it was the best time trial I ever did. Then they tried to put me in the Grand Prix des Nations, but I wasn’t a time-triallist, and at the end of the season, by the time you’ve ridden all of the grand tours and all the contract races in August, you’re absolutely knackered. No way . . .’ Anquetil, of course, rode and won most of them.
1951
1st – Grand Prix Maurice Latour (first victory in fourth race)
1st – Overall in Paris-Normandie’s year-long maillot des jeunes competition for young riders
1st – Normandy team time-trial championships (with Dieulois, Le Ber, Levasseur and Quinet)
12 other victories
1952
1st – French amateur road-race championships (only national road title)
1st – Normandy amateur road-race championships
1st – Grand Prix de France (time trial)
8th – World amateur road-race championships
12th – Olympic Games road race
Bronze medal in Olympic Games team race
1953
1st – Grand Prix des Nations
1st – Grand Prix de Lugano
1st – Tour de la Manche (first race with professionals)
2nd – Barrachi Trophy (with Antonin Rolland)
1954
1st – Grand Prix des Nations
1st – Grand Prix de Lugano
1st – Paris–Nice time-trial stage (the race was in fact called Paris–Côte d’Azur that year)
2nd – Barrachi Trophy (with Louison Bobet)
2nd – Critérium des As
3rd – Grand Prix de Genève (also known as the Grand Prix Martini)
5th – World professional road-race championships
1955
1st – Grand Prix des Nations
1st – Grand Prix de Genève
1st – Stage six Tour of the South-east Provinces
1st – French pursuit championships
2nd – Barrachi Trophy (with André Darrigade)
6th – World professional road-race championships
First, failed, attempt at world hour record – 45.175 kilometres compared with Fausto Coppi’s record of 45.848 kilometres
1956
World hour record – 46.159 kilometres
1st – Grand Prix des Nations
1st – Grand Prix de Genève
1st – French pursuit championships
2nd – World pursuit championships
1957
1st – Tour de France (also winner of four stages)
1st – Paris–Nice (also winner of time-trial stage)
1st – Grand Prix des Nations
1st – Grand Prix de Genève
1st – Paris Six Day (with André Darrigade and Fernando Terruzzi)
4th – Barrachi Trophy (with André Darrigade)
6th – World professional road-race championships
1958
1st – Grand Prix des Nations
1st – Grand Prix de Lugano
1st – Grand Prix de Genève
1st – Four Days of Dunkerque
1st – Paris Six Day (with André Darrigade and Fernando Terruzzi)
2nd – Barrachi Trophy (with André Darrigade)
14th – Paris–Roubaix
Abandoned Tour de France after stage 22 (race won by Charly Gaul)
1959
1st – Grand Prix de Lugano
1st – Grand Prix de Genève
1st – Critérium des As
1st – Four Days of Dunkerque
2nd – Tour of Italy
3rd – Tour de France
3rd – Barrachi Trophy (with André Darrigade)
3rd – Ghent–Wevelgem
9th – World championship road race
1960
1st – Tour of Italy (also winner of two time-trial stages)
1st – Grand Prix de Lugano
1st – Grand Prix de Forli (time trial)
1st – Critérium des As
9th – World professional road-race championships
1961
1st – Tour de France (also winner of two time-trial stages and race leader from firs
t to last day)
1st – Paris–Nice (also winner of time-trial stage)
1st – Grand Prix des Nations
1st – Grand Prix de Lugano
1st – Grand Prix de Forli
1st – Critérium National (first major victory in a one-day race)
2nd – Tour of Italy
5th – Barrachi Trophy (with Michael Stolker)
Winner of Super Prestige Pernod and Prestige Pernod competitions
1962
1st – Tour de France (also winner of two time-trial stages)
1st – Barrachi Trophy (with Rudi Altig – first victory at eighth attempt)
6th – Grand Prix de Lugano
15th – World professional road-race championships
Abandoned Tour of Spain after stage 17 (won by Rudi Altig)
1963
1st – Tour de France (also winner of four stages)
1st – Tour of Spain (also winner of two stages and race leader from first to last day)
1st – Dauphiné-Libéré (also winner of time-trial stage)
1st – Paris–Nice (also winner of time-trial stage)
1st – Critérium National
1st – Ronde d’Auvergne
1st – Critérium des As
2nd – Barrachi Trophy (with Raymond Poulidor)
3rd – French road-race championships
12th – World professional road-race championships
Winner of Super Prestige Pernod and Prestige Pernod competitions
1964
1st – Tour de France (also winner of four stages)
1st – Tour of Italy (also winner of two stages)
1st – Ghent–Wevelgem (first major victory in a one-day race abroad)
6th – Paris–Nice
7th – World professional road-race championships
BBC Overseas Sports Personality of the Year
1965
1st – Dauphiné-Libéré (also winner of three stages)
1st – Bordeaux–Paris
1st – Paris–Nice (also winner of one stage)
1st – Critérium National
1st – Grand Prix des Nations
1st – Grand Prix de Lugano
1st – Barrachi Trophy (with Jean Stablinski)
1st – Grand Prix de Forli
1st – Critérium des As
1st – Manx Premier Trophy
Winner of Super Prestige Pernod and Prestige Pernod competitions
1966
1st – Liège–Bastogne–Liège (first and only victory in one of the five ‘monuments’ of cycling)
1st – Paris–Nice (also winner of one stage)
1st – Tour of Sardinia
1st – Grand Prix des Nations
2nd – World professional road-race championships
3rd – Tour of Italy
3rd – Grand Prix de Lugano
Abandoned Tour de France during stage 19 (race won by Lucien Aimar)
Winner of Super Prestige Pernod competition
1967
1st – Critérium National
1st – Tour of Catalonia
2nd – Barrachi Trophy (with Bernard Guyot)
2nd – Critérium des As
2nd – French pursuit championships
3rd – Tour of Italy
World hour record (not ratified due to failure to comply with drug test) – 47.493 kilometres compared with Roger Rivière’s record of 47.347 kilometres
1968
1st – Barrachi Trophy (with Felice Gimondi)
4th – Liège–Bastogne–Liège
10th – Paris–Nice
11th – World professional road-race championships
1969
1st – Tour of the Basque Country
3rd – Paris–Nice
Bibliography
Books
Anquetil, Dominique, Anquetil, Jacques par Dominique (Editions Denoël, 1989)
Anquetil, Jacques with Joly, Pierre, En brûlant les étapes (Calmann-Levy, 1966)
Anquetil, Sophie, Pour l’amour de Jacques (Editions Grasset, 2004)
Augendre, Jacques, Guide historique et culturel du Tour de France (ASO, 2003, 2007)
Fotheringham, William, Put Me Back on My Bike (Yellow Jersey Press, 2002)
Géminiani, Raphaël, Les années Anquetil: chronique d’une époque bafouée (Editions Denoël, 1990)
Marchand, Jacques, Anquetil le Rebelle (Editions Prolongations, 2007)
Meade, Marion, The Unruly Life of Woody Allen (Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2000)
Ollivier, Jean-Paul, Jacques Anquetil: la véridique histoire (Editions Glénat, 1994)
Pélissier, Pierre, La légende de Jacques Anquetil (Editions Rageot, 1997)
Penot, Christophe, Pierre Chany, L’Homme aux 50 Tours de France (Editions Cristel, 1996)
Poulidor, Raymond with Brouchon, Jean-Paul, Poulidor intime (Editions Jacob-Duvernet, 2007)
Yates, Richard, Master Jacques: The Enigma of Jacques Anquetil (Mousehold Press, 2001)
Films
Jacques Anquetil – The Man, The Mystery, The Legend (World Cycling Productions, 1998)
Magazines and Newspapers
Almost every francophone newspaper the world over has at some time run articles on Anquetil’s career and/or life, and the same is true for the English-language cycling press. As a result, it has been necessary to read so many articles from so many papers to come to terms with Anquetil’s achievements that it is impossible to cite them all individually: some have come from scrapbooks, such as the one donated to Sophie Anquetil by a dedicated fan of her father, some have come from the author’s own collection, some have come from having been incorporated into the archives of other magazines. The list below merely includes those publications that have been referred to during my research.
Cycle Sport (including 2004 special supplement)
Cycling
Cycling Weekly (including 1987 commemorative edition)
Cyclisme Magazine
Dolce Vita
France Dimanche (including 1987 commemorative edition and Anquetil’s own articles written from 4 to 25 July 1967)
France Soir
Ici Paris
L’03
L’Aurore
